May 12, 2022
New Release: Reverse Record Update
We’re updating ICNS to provide a cleaner and more robust experience for the reverse record feature that translates names into addresses 🚀
We’ve redesigned the reverse record-setting experience to ensure there is no room for mistakes or confusion when associating an ID with a name.
Let’s go over the new definitions that restrict the functionality, and how it’ll be best used.
Reverse Records — Flow Update 👥
What are reverse records? Let’s do a quick recap. After youconnect your wallet to the ICNS app and visit your “My Account” page, you’ll find the option to set an .icp name as your wallet’s address reverse record.
What does that actually do? When you activate that option, your Principal ID gets associated with that .icp name and any app that integrates with ICNS will directly display that said .icp name, instead of your Principal ID.
This feature is separate from the Principal ID record, which is used to determine what Principal ID should example.icp resolve to when called on for a transaction (the other way around!).
That could cause confusion when your reverse record for name.icp is set to Address A, but your Principal ID record is set to Address B. Meaning in any dApp or UI, instead of showing Address A, it would show name.icp, but if you transfer to name.icp… It would transfer to Address B! Weird, right?
The Changes Introduced 🧰
While we agree that giving the user the most granular control over records is great; in this case, we believe it is best to avoid confusion and narrow down the scope.
That is why now you can only set your reverse record to the same address as you have on the Principal ID. If the Principal ID record is not set when you set a reverse record, it’ll be automatically set with it.
- Address A ➡️resolves to ➡️ name.icp
- Name.icp ➡️ resolves to ➡️ Address A
Moreover, the Account ID field will now be automatically derived from the Principal ID field. Both changes come to avoid confusion, impersonation attempts, or mix-ups in important situations like asset transfers.
If you change the Principal ID record, and you have a Reverse Record set, your Reverse Record will be reset and cleared.
